Breaking News: Idaho Governor Signs Dangerous Ag-Gag Bill Into Law

Despite protests and widespread opposition, yesterday Idaho
governor C.L. "Butch" Otter signed into law a dangerous ag-gag bill
that aims to prevent whistleblowers from taking photographs or video inside
factory farms that abuse animals. The bill was backed by the state's corrupt dairy industry,
which desperately seeks to hide evidence of the horrific
animal abuse that runs rampant on factory farms throughout Idaho.
Mercy For Animals founder and executive director, Nathan Runkle, had this to
say about today's ag-gag bill becoming law:

Governor Otter has failed Idaho and the
American people. By signing this bill into law, he has sided with those who
seek to keep Idaho's corrupt factory farming practices hidden from public view
and created a safe haven for animal abuse and other criminal activity in the
state. Mercy For Animals is exploring all legal avenues to overturn this
dangerous, unconstitutional, and un-American law.

Not only will this ag-gag law perpetuate
animal abuse, it endangers workers' rights, consumer health and safety, and the
freedom of journalists, employees, and the public at large to share information
about something as fundamental as our food supply. This law is bad for
consumers, who want more, not less, transparency in food production.

Bowing to pressure from the corporate
factory farming interests in Idaho, Governor Otter betrayed the will of his
constituents and the majority of Americans who strongly oppose efforts to
criminalize whistleblowers who dare to expose cruelty and corruption on Idaho's
farms. Clearly Governor Otter knows that Idaho's factory farmers have a lot to
hide from the American people if he is willing to go to such despicable lengths
to conceal their cruel and abusive practices.

Although similar ag-gag bills have been
proposed in states all across the country at the behest of the multibillion-dollar meat, dairy, and egg
industries, the majority of those bills have been defeated.
Unfortunately, Idaho's flawed and misdirected new law will now throw shut the
doors to industrial factory farms and allow animal abuse, environmental
violations, and food contamination to flourish undetected, unchallenged, and
unaddressed.

Consumers have a right to know how their
food is produced and how animals on factory farms are abused so they can make
informed choices. But now, due to this misguided law, consumers would be wise
to assume that food produced on Idaho farms is the product of systematic
cruelty and corruption.

Undercover investigations by Mercy For
Animals and other groups have led to landmark corporate animal welfare policy
reforms, new and improved laws to protect farmed animals and the environment,
felony convictions of animal abusers, increased
consumer protection and food safety initiatives, and the closure of
particularly corrupt facilities. Without undercover investigations, there are
oftentimes no effective watchdogs protecting animals from egregious cruelty in
these facilities or the public from serious health violations.

Why was Idaho's corrupt dairy industry so
determined to silence undercover investigators? See for yourself: